As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
An information handling system may include within it various information handling resources, including without limitation processors, storage devices, network interfaces, and/or other devices. Such information handling resources are often modular, in the sense that such information handling resources may mechanically and electrically couple to an information handling system via a receptacle connector. A receptacle connector is typically a system, device, or apparatus mounted on a circuit board (e.g., motherboard, backplane, mid-plane, etc.) and having electrically-conductive pins configured to engage with corresponding electrically-conductive pins of a plug connector or edge connector of an information handling resource, in order to electrically couple the information handling resource to the circuit board. In some embodiments, the receptacle connector may be configured to allow for easy insertion and removal of the information handling resource into and from the receptacle connector by a user.
One feature often desired in an information handling resource is that it be hot pluggable. Hot plugging involves the addition of an information handling resource to expand functionality of an information handling system or removal of such an information handling resource without significant interruption to the operation of the information handling system. Thus, when an information handling resource is hot-pluggable, a user can insert and remove the information handling resource without rebooting or powering down the information handling resource.
In most instances, when inserting and removing a hot-pluggable information handling resource, it is desired that the various electrically-conductive pins of the information handling resource plug or edge connector be coupled to corresponding pins of the receptacle connector in a manner that allows for a desired sequencing of power and signals for the information handling resource. To accomplish this, many hot-pluggable information handling resources have plug or edge connectors with staggered pins. However, some types of information handling resources have pin outs and/or pin lengths conforming to a particular standard (e.g., the M.2 standard) and thus such devices cannot be modified to have staggered pins without deviating from the standard.